So far this week, we’ve studied what Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 5:20, when he says, “Do not hold prophecies in contempt.” But what do we do with the fact that the person is teaching something or prophesying about something that might be incorrect doctrine or teaching?
Paul addresses that important concern in what he writes in verse 21, “but test them all.”
When you hear a teaching on television, on a podcast, on YouTube, or any sermon like the ones I give at Faith Church, test them. Evaluate them.
In our culture, when we are bombarded with content so frequently, we can get burnt out of the idea of having to evaluate what we hear. Why can’t there be news we can trust? Why can’t we just trust the pastor to be faithful to the word of God?
We might actually feel iffy about evaluating the preaching of the pastor, especially when the pastor has gone to school for this, studied the bible and theology, and, thus, who are we to question him?
Please, question me. Evaluate my blog posts. Test your pastor’s preaching.
The Bereans in Acts 17 did this to Paul. “As soon as it was night, the believers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea. On arriving there, they went to the Jewish synagogue. Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true. As a result, many of them believed, as did also a number of prominent Greek women and many Greek men.” (Acts 17:10–12)
This is one reason why at Faith Church, I have sermon discussion class, after the worship service. In sermon discussion class, I invite people to examine, question, evaluate, and test the sermon. There have been plenty of times in sermon discussion when someone asked me a question about the scripture passage or my sermon, and I had to admit that I got my interpretation wrong or I missed something important in the text.
Bible prophets, teachers, speakers, preachers, and authors are not Holy Spirit robots who are spitting out exactly what the Holy Spirit wants to say. Some of the preachers out there are malicious, intent on trying to deceive. Some are just misguided. Some have heard a teaching all their lives, and they have never really examined it, so they are just keeping it alive, even though it has been debunked. Some make interpretational mistakes. Some don’t study enough.
There is also the reality that we Christians have differences of opinion about how to interpret scripture. Faith Church is a member of a denomination called the Evangelical Congregational Church, which has a history in a doctrinal viewpoint called Wesleyan-Arminianism. Then there are the churches that we rent to. One has a Baptist heritage. One is Orthodox. One is Pentecostal. One is Seventh-Day Adventist. All are Christian. All agree on the major doctrines of faith, but we have many, many differences of opinion about minor doctrines. As they saying goes, then, there is much wisdom in majoring on the majors, and minoring on the minors.
That’s what Paul is getting at when he says in verses 21 and 22, “hold on to what is good, reject every kind of evil.” We Christians come together by emphasizing our unity in the good, and we reject the evil.
Photo by Taiki Ishikawa on Unsplash
Engaging Scripture 